The end or the beginning?

By Fr. Stanley J. Krempa|
Catholic Herald

11/09/16

Gospel Commentary LK 21:5-19

Today’s Gospel is both grim and hopeful. It is about something
far deeper than cosmic collapse. Jesus gives us three powerful truths on which
to reflect as we approach the end of one church year and the start of another.

The first truth arises from the destruction of the Jerusalem
Temple. The Temple must have been a stunning sight. The stones from which it
was built are estimated to have weighed between 10 and 40 tons. They were carved
so precisely that no mortar was needed to keep them in place.

The section of the Temple that is visited today (the so-called
“Wailing Wall”) is not even part of the original Temple, but a section of the
western side of the outer Temple courtyard, a huge gathering space before
people entered the Temple itself. It must have been a wonder to behold. Yet,
Jesus says that this magnificent Temple will be destroyed.

In fact, it is not only physical structures such as the Temple
that eventually collapse but the political structures we create that will
collapse as well.

Consider the empires that have come and gone: the Roman Empire,
the British, the Spanish, the Ottoman, the French, the Holy Roman Empire, the
Byzantine, the Russian, the Persian, the Japanese, the German empire or Reich,
the Mongol, the Austro-Hungarian and many more. Human history is a huge
graveyard of extinct empires. They all had their day in the sun and then went
into decline either by conquest or decay.

The church has been witness to all this. An empire that has
endured is what has been called, “the empire of souls” or the communion of
saints. This is the Kingdom of God and His Church. This spiritual kingdom will
endure. The powers of the earth rise and fall. Only the Kingdom of God lasts.

The second point the Lord teaches us is that conflict, tension,
conquest and persecution will be part of the human life and of the church’s
story throughout time. In fact, history teaches us that peace is not the usual
state of affairs. War is. Whether that war is political, military, commercial
or ideological, it is not an exception to human life. War will be with us until
the end of history. Enduring peace will come not from political negotiations
but only from God. God’s peace is a peace that the world cannot give.

The third point the Lord makes is that by faithful perseverance
to the Gospel and our union with Christ, we will be saved because we are part
of the Kingdom of God.

Empires come and go. Leaders come and go. Political philosophies
come and go. What remains is the empire of souls, founded on the death and
Resurrection of Christ.

We can then understand Malachi’s prophecy in today’s first
reading. The final conflict, the ultimate purification will come in God’s good
time and with it will also come final healing (the “sun with its healing
rays”). That is why the early Christians looked to Christ’s return not as a
time of terror but of final redemption, healing and peaceful repose. The Lord’s
return is not the end but the beginning of perpetual peace.

St. Paul insists, however, that we are not to sit back, fold our
hands and wait for the Lord to return to do the heavy lifting. Rather, we are
to do what Jesus commanded us to do, to preach the Gospel and to bring people
into the Kingdom of God. The work of the church and of every parish in her is
not to sit back and await the end. The church is not meant to be a waiting
room. Rather, it is the headquarters of the work of expanding the reach and
population of Christ’s empire of souls. Each of us is called to be part of that
expansion and reach.

Christ’s “empire of souls” is the one empire that will last
forever. We call it the “communion of saints and life everlasting.”